Bentley Little - The Summoning

They walked out of the entryway into the chapel.

The fear she'd experienced only seconds before was nothing compared to the powerful new emotion Sue felt now, this gradation of terror that had no name. Every fiber of her being was telling her to get out of here, to turn tail and run, and it took every ounce of courage she had to override that instinct.

The inside of the church looked like a taxidermist' paradise. The walls were festooned with the bodies of go cats and javelin as sucked dry and suspended from hooks. Dead hawks hung on wires from the high vaulted ceiling. There was no floor, only hard dirt, and there were three huge openings in the earth, each the size of a small room

Next to each opening were piles, of debris No, not debris. Plants and animals.

Sacrifices to the cup hugirngsi.

"esus "

Rich whispered behind her.

She turned her attention toward the front of that church. At the foot of the altar, a crowd of dead animals was arranged around Jesus' feet.

The figure of Jesus itsei impaled on a grossly oversize cross She sucked in her breath, took a step forward, shining her flashlight.

Jesus was the dead and mounted body of Jim Hollis. She stared at the figure. The ranch owner's dried and shriveled form was nailed to the cross with what looked like old railroad spikes, and the spikes had shattered and flattened the withered hands and feet through which they'd been pounded. Hollis's eyes were missing--black holes rimmed with wrinkled skin marking where they had been--and all of the teeth had been knocked out of his mouth. "

The martyred figure seemed blasphemous to Sue, and as she turned to look at her companions, she saw the expressions of fear, shock, and revulsion on their faces.

"It is a warning," her grandmother said. "The cup hu

/rngs/is trying to scare us away."

"It's succeeding," Sue said in Cantoncs i She translated her grandmother's words into English.

"Where's the vampire?" Rossiter asked, and the sound of his flat, totally unemotional voice made everything sccma little less frightening. It was calming. Sue was ddenly glad the FBI agent was with them.

She translated her grandmother's words as the old woman spoke them: "It is underneath us. The cup g/rngs/must spend most of its daylight hours in the earth."

"So we have to go down there?" Robert pointed toward the openings. Sue nodded.

"He can't go over flowing water," Woods said. "Can he go under it?"

Sue had not thought of that. She looked again toward her grandmother, translated the question. Her grandmother frowned, and Sue realized that she had not thought of this possibility either. "We will find out," Sue repeated the words in English. The answer did not seem to boost anyone's confide no "How do we get down there?" Rich asked.

Robert pointed at two hubs of metal peeking over that a of the middle hole. "Ladder. If I'm not mistaking This is the one that our friend the Pastor used right there. "I'll go first," Rossiter volunteered.

Robert nodded. "I'll go last."

It took nearly ten minutes for all of them to dim down. Sue did not like heights, and more than once she thought she would slip, her hands were so sweaty. finally they made it safely to the bottom. Her grandmother had little more difficulty. The old woman's legs were tired, her grip weak, and even with Rich climbing directly below her, helping her down, she still needed extra assistance race. Woods came after her, periodically reaching down ) help hold her hands between one rung and another when she reached the tunnel floor, she was sweating an out of breath, her overly rapid pulse visible in the throl f her neck.

Once again, Sue realized how old her grandmother was and how frail.

What if she had a heart attack before they even found he cup hugirngsit. Sue pushed the thought from her.

The air down here was dank and fetid. It smelled almost like a sewer or a dump. Almost. But there was enough odor here, the stench of death, a dusty, decaying scei that just missed being cloyingly sweet.

Rich climbed halfway back up the ladder, took the ba gnva from his brother, handed it down to Woods.

"All here," Robert announced a few moments later he hopped off the ladder. He was feigning a confidence he lid not feel, but Sue admired his bravery.

She looked down the length of the tunnel, shining her flashlight. They were all shining their lights, the beams following the eyes and interests of their owners, and it produced a low-level strobe effect that made the high and strangely rounded passage seem that much deeper and darker.

"One of us will die," her grandmother said softly.

There was surprise in her voice.

And fear.

She had not expected this.

Sue felt cold. She shone her light on the old woman's face, then quickly moved it away when her grandmother shut her eyes against the beam.

"What did she say?" Robert asked.

""We'd better start walking," Sue said.

She let them think it was a translation.

Rich looked over at Woods, placed his spear in his flashlight hand, and picked up his half of the baht gwa. He shone his flashlight into the tunnel ahead. He had expected the other two openings in the floor of the church to empty here as well, but the hole through which they'd come was at the beginning of this passage, which meant that the other openings led to different tunnels altogether. Tunnels heading in other directions.

He hoped they were going the right way.

He didn't want to be caught in this labyrinth when night fell.

"What direction are we heading?" he asked suddenly. Robert looked at him. "East. Why?" "The streams."

Robert looked up. "I didn't even think about that." He looked back up through the hole to the church, then glanced down the length of the tunnel, gauging its direclion. "Luck of the Irish," he said. "I think we're safe. I think we're between the streams. Assuming that idea works at all."

"If the cup hugirngsi's close enough. If the streams don't peter out."

.... "You know," Buford said, "I bet this empties out by the arroyo."

Robert nodded. "I bet you're right."

They began walking. Multiple flashlight beams scanned the curved sides of the tunnel. Rich looked over at his brother. He could tell from Robert's expression that he felt foolish with the willow spear in his hand, the jade choker around his neck. He would probably have felt more comfortable with his fingers around the butt of a45, but he obviously knew that his usual modes of thought did not apply down here.

In a true show of faith, Robert had even left his rifle outside with Steve. He knew that they were not dealing with a criminal, or even with the type of movie monster that could be taken out by firepower.

They were up against something so old and alien that even their knowledge of the supernatural could have no bearing on their actions.

They were entirely in the hands of Sue's grandmother. Rich, too, would have probably felt more secure if Robert and the FBI agent were packing heat, but he knew that was just conditioning. They were as safe now as they could possibly be under the circumstances.

No matter what happened, he thought, no matter how things turned out, he was proud to be here. Proud to be there with these six people.

Even Rossiter.

They continued walking. And then he heard it. The Laughing Man.

% His mouth suddenly felt as though it was filled with cotton, his saliva dried up at the source. The sound was coming from far away, from somewhere deep in the tunnel but even faint and muffled, he recognized the sound of the Laughing Man. His brain told him that this merely his own demon projected back at him, that the cup hugirngsi looked like that baby-faced monster from the videotape, that no one else probably even heard the sound, but his instinct was stronger than his intellect, and was suddenly deeply and uncontrollably afraid. He knew he could not face the Laughing Man again. He was not brave enough to see it once more.